Lockheed Constellation

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The Lockheed Constellation ("Connie") is a propeller-driven, four-engined airliner built by Lockheed Corporation starting in 1943. The Constellation series was the first civil airliner family to enter widespread use equipped with a pressurized cabin, enabling it to fly well above most bad weather, thus improving the general safety and ease of commercial passenger air travel. Several models of the Constellation series were produced, all with the distinctive triple tail and dolphin-shaped fuselage. Most were powered by four 18-cylinder Wright R-3350 Duplex-Cyclones. In total, 856 were produced between 1943 and 1958 at Lockheed's plant in Burbank, California, and used as civil airliners and as a military and civilian cargo transports. They were notably used during the Berlin and the Biafran airlifts. Three served as the presidential aircraft for Dwight D. Eisenhower, one of which is at the National Museum of the United States Air Force.

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